Party flags and different election marketing campaign materials are on sale at a store in Madurai on march 23, 2024.
| Photo Credit: R. Ashok
Signalling a pointy rise in spending forward of the fiscal year-end, the Centre’s fiscal deficit soared from 64% of the revised estimates in January to 86.5% by the top of February, with capital expenditure recording a sequential bounce to ₹84,400 crore final month.
In absolute worth phrases, the deficit hit ₹15 lakh crore within the first eleven months of 2023-24, from simply ₹11 lakh crore on the finish of January, and was nearly 3.5% over the ₹14.5 lakh crore over the identical interval within the final monetary yr.
Economists consider the ultimate numbers for this yr, to be launched on the finish of April, will probably be nicely throughout the ₹17.Three lakh crore revised goal set in final month’s Union Budget, with a superb probability it could undershoot the aim that’s equal to 5.8% of GDP.
The Centre nonetheless has headroom left for ₹6 lakh crore of income spending in March, 9% over the ₹5.5 lakh crore spent within the final month of 2022-23, Aditi Nayar, chief economist at ICRA identified.
On the capex entrance, the federal government nonetheless wants to spend ₹1.four lakh crore in March to meet its goal, which is a tad decrease than the ₹1.5 lakh crore spent in March 2023. However, the capex aim is probably going to be missed thanks to the Model Code of Conduct for the upcoming General Elections kicking in, Ms. Nayar reckoned.
“The government accounts show the Centre’s spending is still short of its target by about ₹7.4 lakh crore with major shortfalls seen in Agriculture (₹20,668 crore), Rural Development (₹48,088 crore), Chemicals and Fertilisers (₹16,150 crore), Roads (₹26,000 crore) and Consumer Affairs (₹35,117 crore),” stated Bank of Baroda chief economist Madan Sabnavis. If these quantities aren’t exhausted in March, it might lead to financial savings of ₹50,000-₹60,000 crore, he emphasised.